Knowing
by lrigD
Summary: She doesn't say a word, but he knows. Previous one-shot, set somewhere in season 7. R&R!
1. Chapter 1

_**I got this idea from another fic - I hope that doesn't make it plagiarism, because this is still very different from that one. It doesn't pertain to any episode in particular, though it's definitely season 7...**_

_**Don't own NCIS or anything related to it. Well, I do have a couple of DVD boxes, but that's about it. **_

_**Please review!**_

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She doesn't say a word, but he knows.

He can see it in the way she moves. Her paces are more measured, more carefully counted. Less fluent, somehow. Like she's still getting used to moving around on her own legs.

It's hard to notice, he will admit that. But that doesn't mean he's not disappointed that nobody else seems to notice how she cringes slightly every once in a while, particularly when they have been standing still a long time. When that happens, she moves her arms or legs, seemingly shaking them loose. But the grimace that accompanies those movements tell him otherwise.

She doesn't talk about it, and he would've expected nothing less from her. Ziva is not one to suffer out loud. He is willing to bet that during her time in Somalia, she did not shout once.

He sees the wounds. Not literally: she keeps herself covered up, he has never really seen any mark on her, but he knows they're there. He can read her injuries just by watching her move. He sees how she favours her left arm and how she constantly moves her fingers, stretching and tensing them.

She moves more slowly. He is sure her reflexes are still great, but she has stopped making unnecessary movements. He is not sure she is even consciously doing it; it could be a reminder from those dark days a few weeks ago, when every movement meant more pain, more energy wasted. She might not even know that she took that part of Somalia with her back home.

He sees other things too, things he is sure she will never talk about, not unless she has a monumental breakdown. And in all his years, he has only seen her break down once; and at the time, he was not yet fully recovered from his amnesia, and he is not sure what part of his memory is playing tricks, and what is reality.

Still, he is sure of what he sees now. And it makes him ball his fist in useless anger. There is nothing he can do now, nothing to somehow _avenge_ her; as it is, they are far away from that place, and it is for the better.

But it does not stop him from wanting to hurt those who did this to her. He knows it is not just Saleem; he cannot say how he knows, but the thought had formed in his mind when he had first seen her and had firmly implanted itself, until he was unable to think otherwise.

He knows they have violated her body in the worst way a woman can be violated; still, she does not talk. Beatings are not as hard to admit, and she has certainly never denied that part of her imprisonment, though she has never exactly confirmed it, either.

But such a primal act against nature is the hardest to admit. He has seen it many times. And he is not surprised that this is not any different for Ziva.

He knows that talking about it will only serve to make her more uncomfortable. There are people out there she is more likely to talk to, because they are easier to talk to, or maybe understand her better. He is not going to force the issue. And he knows that talking won't heal everything – oh, he knows that like nothing else.

But he looks at her with worried eyes, and somehow she understands what he tries to tell her, she knows what he knows. And for a moment, she looks scared, but then her face relaxes into some form of acceptation.

And he knows she will be ready to talk soon.

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_**I'm kind of unsure about this one. It's written from Gibbs' point of view (if you couldn't tell, I probably made it pretty hard) and I've never done that before, simply because he is such a complex character. So I'm not sure how I did, and I'd really appreciate reviews on this one!**_


	2. Chapter 2

_**First of all, thanks so much for all the reviews! I'm overwhelmed, I seriously am.**_

_**I was in the right mood today and I wrote another chapter. This is not beta'ed and I'm not native English, so please excuse any mistakes.**_

_**Another part might follow! For now, please enjoy =)**_

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"Ziva." His tone is light, but he knows she will understand what he means.

She stops and turns around to look at him, eyes inquisitive but still not quite _alive_.

"Yes?" The same nonchalant use of her voice.

He is silent for a moment, searching for words. When it comes to her, it is always best to be careful with what comes out of his mouth.

"I need you to come with me." He settles with that, buying himself some more time. He expects her to protest, but she just nods and follows him into the elevator.

They stand next to each other in tense silence, facing the shiny elevator doors. That is, until he steps forward and flicks the switch, so that suddenly the elevator stops moving and they are stuck in their own world.

"You visited the shrink." It was a statement, not a question, but she replies anyway.

"Yes. It was mandatory." She pauses. "It was useless."

He is not surprised; she has adopted much of Tony's, and his, attitude towards help. Of course, it doesn't help that she has been taught to be completely independent from the word go.

"What would _you_ recommend, then?" He asks her. He knows what needs to happen, but he doesn't want to have to force her. It should be her own decision.

She pauses, the silence stretching on longer than last time. When she speaks, her voice is a lot hoarser and he fights his paternal instincts to comfort her.

"Gibbs, I know I need to..." she searches for the right word, "... _deal_ with it."

He's not surprised by her words, but the intensity and sincerity with which she says it is new. It implies she actually _wants_ to deal with it, which he hadn't expected. He had thought that Ziva was one of those people who stuffed everything away in their minds, until it came pouring out one day. And after that day, she would start all over again with stuffing away.

"However, the fact remains..." her formal language tells him she is trying to compose herself. "I cannot."

"Deal with it?" he asks.

She nods, then corrects herself. "I _can_ deal with it – just not in the way she wants me to."

"She wants you to talk about it?" he already knows the answer to the question.

She nods again. "I have always been taught to keep to myself," she starts. "Never let anybody see how you feel, never appear weak." She gives a hoarse laugh. "I guess I failed that the minute I stepped into this building."

He smiles briefly, remembering those first days.

"Ziva." He waits until she is turned towards him and he knows he has her full attention.

"I think I agree with her. But-" he holds up a hand when she starts to protest, "- I also think you should not be forced to do so." He regarded her silently. "In your own time, Ziva. When you are ready."

He steps forward to flick the switch again, but her voice stops him.

"I think-" her voice shakes slightly. "I think I will be ready soon."

He nods, then continues forward. The elevator starts to move again, up this time.

They stand in silence once again, but this time, it is less awkward. He feels like the air has been cleaned, and he knows she feel the same. Still, he feels the need to say something.

"I know."

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	3. Chapter 3

_**Finally came round to finishing this - more A/N at the bottom. For now, I don't own NCIS, and enjoy!**_

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His eyebrows shoot up in surprise when he hears the knock on his door. It reminds him he still needs to fix his bell: it had broken down months ago and he just can't seem to get around to do it.

Frowning, he wipes his oily hands off a cloth and exits the basement. Who was visiting him this hour of day?

Opening the door, he finds out.

She is standing on the pavement in front of his house, hands in her pockets, her face carefully devoid of the fear she is probably feeling. He had not expected her to go to _him_: rather Tony or Ducky or perhaps even Abby. But not him. He knows too much, has too much history to be safe.

Then again, maybe that is why she chose him. She doesn't need to tell him everything; there are certain things he does not need to use his imagination for.

"Ziva." He steps aside to let her enter; in that second between opening the door and talking, he knows what she is here for.

"Gibbs." She acknowledges him. Then she takes a deep breath. "It is late; are you sure..."

He doesn't let her finish. He turns around to close the door while she talks, and when he turns back around, she is staring decidedly at the beige walls of his house.

"I have nowhere to be," he replies with a shrug. He's got all the time in the world.

She nods and he steps in front of her to lead her to his living room. He knows she has never been here before, but she only gives the room a cursory glance: enough to make sure there are no threats, but too little to take anything in.

"I'll make tea," he says. Normally, he'd go for coffee, but in this case he has a feeling coffee is too strong, too regular. Tea is the accepted alternative. They will need its comfort later.

He takes out the kettle from a dusty shelf. He searches for tea bags he has not seen in years; he is not even sure he still has them.

She must have heard him pulling open cabinets, because suddenly she is in his kitchen. "Can't find any tea bags?" she asks with a ghost of a smile on her face. She knows exactly what is going on. He nods while rummaging through a bottom drawer, and she stops him by pulling him up by his shoulder. She seems just as surprised as he is by that move; she quickly lets go of his arms and smiles apologetically.

"I can make tea without tea bags," she says. "That may be easier than spending our time searching for them."

She, of course, knows where the herbs are with the first drawer she opens. She takes out a few of them, frowning at the content of the drawer; he almost laughs, because this feels so _normal_. He hadn't known Ziva could make tea, but it does not surprise him.

"Here you go," she says when the water finally boils. She puts the selected herbs into two mugs and he pours the water over it. Then, they both seem to realize what she is here for and what they are doing, and they release the mugs at the same time.

They return to the living room, both holding a large mug in their hands. He knows tea shouldn't be drunk from mugs, but they are big and comfortable, and he has always enjoyed them.

"I do not know if I can do this," she breaks the silence. "And I do not know how to do this."

He shrugs. "There's no manual for it."

Seconds of silence stretch into minutes, but he keeps quiet. He wants to give her the time she evidently needs to collect her thoughts, to know where to begin on this shaky ground. He sips his tea and so does she, both of them waiting for the first words. She opens her mouth a few times, but then closes it again. He can see she is restless.

"You read my file."

He replies to the statement with a nod. Yes, he has read her file, the collection of facts and dates in them. Officially, he knows everything that has happened.

Unofficially, he knows there is so much more.

"I did not write down everything." When he nods again, she looks at him, surprise shining in her otherwise carefully constructed emotionless state. It's time for him to say something.

"I notice certain things in the way you move, the way you carry yourself." He is silent for a few short seconds. "I've been doing this work for over 30 years now, Ziva. Besides, I know a thing or two about women," he adds in an attempt to make the situation less tense for her. She smiles, but it doesn't reach her eyes.

And then she starts to talk. She explains the events leading up to her capture in Somalia – nothing he already doesn't know, seeing as he read the file. But he knows she needs this for herself.

She doesn't stop with the beginning of her imprisonment – she tells of the room she was first placed in, a room with an actual bed and a toilet. She says that they started out gently with her – no pain, just questions. When she didn't answer, they became aggrevated and started taunting her – threatening her with torture, with death. She didn't budge. Gibbs hadn't expected her to.

"They transferred me to a different room then. That has been my cell for the rest of my ... stay."

She doesn't need to tell him of the conditions of her new living environment – he has no doubt it had no bed, no toilet, probably no window either, to keep her disoriented. He's more familiar with kidnapping and torture techniques than he wishes.

"The first time, I did not even know what was going on." She explains that she had not gotten any food for three days when she was first taken to be interrogated, only dirty water – which had no doubt made her hallucinate.

"They took me to another room – there was a girl in there, the daughter of one of my Mossad friends. Shena. She looked okay, they had not treated her like they did me. She was not drugged and she had plenty of food, but she was only seven – too young to be without her mother.

I had to sit opposite her and watch them beat her. They wanted to break me by using a child."

That is when her shield breaks for the first time, and he gets a glimpse of an upset Ziva.

"It is a technique used by Mossad, too. Not me personally – but now I know what it feels like. I started begging them eventually, I just couldn't be responsible for Shena – for her pain, I just couldn't... and they stopped when I started begging, they took me away again, back to my cell, and told me this is what they'd do more often. And then they left me alone."

She let out a breath.

"I do not know how long I was stuck without any food or water – but by the time they came for me again, I was exhausted, dehydrated and beyond famished. I was very weak, I could – I couldn't walk."

She lifts her head and looks at him. He tries to listen to her story without judging, without getting angry on her behalf – he tries to see it as a fictional work, but it doesn't work very well, and when she looks at him he gives her a kind of half-smile, trying to encourage her. It works, because she continues.

"Shena was not with me this time – just the men and me, and a chair. They asked about NCIS, and when I could not answer them, they injected me with something. I think it is what they gave Tony, too – a kind of truth serum. I could feel the urge to talk, to let go of my secrets, but somehow I had enough sanity to know that was not the right thing to do."

He remembers the first few hours after they had rescued Ziva; Tony had been talking incessantly about everything from his childhood summer camp to an actor whose name he'd forgotten – if he had known then it was truth serum that made him talk, he would have listened more carefully.

"I did not want them to be suspicious so I made up a story. They let me go that time, they gave me food and water and I actually felt better."

The silence that follows her words is ominous.

"But then, somehow, they found out I'd lied, and then – obviously they had checked what I had told and found it to be untrue, and they shoved me into a room and just-" she breaks off, a red tinge of embarrassment on her cheeks. He stays still, not knowing how to strengthen her. After a few moments, she opens her mouth again.

"I was not feeling very well because my menstruation was coming – I still got it – and the... situation made it even worse. They – they, uh, kicked me in my stomach, any body part they could reach. I think I lost consciousness at one point, because when I woke up, I was in my room again, and I was covered in blood and bruises."

"They let me recover for a few days – it is well known technique – and then continued their ... approach. It did not become worse at first, but it made me weaker."

He senses she is only coming to the hard part now; he can see it in the way she looks down at her lap, and how she absently, unconsciously perhaps, cradles her stomach.

"They did not use extensive devices on me, just their bodies. Their ..." and she breaks off again. She looks down at the carpet, and he knows she has to collect all her courage, her need for healing, to continue.

"I think you can imagine the things a man can do to a woman."

He nods, a single movement of his head that still catches her eye. He realizes the pain it must have caused her to suffer through this, and possibly even more pain to be able to speak about it. He wants to tell her to stop, that it's okay, he knows – but he also knows she needs this, even if she doesn't realize it.

"It was not Saleem, not at first, he – he used me as a kind of ... reward, towards his men, to show his appreciation, but – then he wanted to, uh, join."

More than ever he wants to cross the room to the chair opposite his and hold her, rock her and make her pain go away. It's the same instinct he had with Shannon and Kelly, one he often has with Abby and sometimes with Tony and Tim, too. He sees it as a positive part of their relationship, even if he doesn't encourage it.

This, however, is a different matter. Ziva is dear to him, and the things she has been through only serve to make his instinct sharper, because he _knows_ she cannot take much more until she really snaps and does something she'll regret the rest of her life.

"How many times?" He knows quantity doesn't matter, not in this case, where even once can destroy someone's life. But he has a intense need to _know_ the facts that are not in her file, to get to know more of this woman so he can somehow help.

She is quiet for a long time, and in her expressions he can see she is revisiting those days and those particular moments. That is when he stands up resolutely. In the back of his mind, there is a nagging voice telling him to back off, but he doesn't listen, and insteads crosses the room to the chair.

It's a bit of an awkward hug, with him bending over while she is sitting, but he doesn't care. Somehow they both end up on the floor and he rocks her back and forth, stroking her sleek hair with one hand while the other is supporting her back.

She stiffens at first – still not used to a comforting touch, especially in light of the recent conversation – but he persists, and slowly, oh so slowly, her muscles relax, the imminent threat of danger disappearing.

"Too often," she finally mumbles, and he barely realizes it's an answer to his question.

No further words are uttered by her as she starts to cry. He only knows when something wet touches his shirt – like much else, she cries in silence. There is no need for silly words of comfort – instead, he continues rocking her back and forth as he sits cross-legged on the floor.

And then, after a while, she starts to really cry, her body heaving with sobs and her face red and blotchy from the tears – still, he does not speak.

There is no need for words when actions speak so loud.

_Silence is the most powerful scream._

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_**Well, 'to know' has lost all meaning to me now, but anyway xD**_

_**I kept pushing this around, sometimes writing really small pieces, but I was determined to finish it so I finally did tonight. **_

_**I'm afraid the one to last sentence is unclear, but I didn't know how else to phrase what I wanted to say - what I mean by 'actions' was the fact that Ziva cries, admits pain and defeat and shows it. That's a pretty significant step for it.**_

_**Very anxious for any reviews! Personally I loved to write this little story and I think it's pretty good, too, but I'd love to know what other people think. Please review!  
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